Workplace Flexibility and Employee Performance in Kraft Foods - Essay Example

Download file to see previous pages Possible options include telecommuting, job sharing, part-time work, compressed work weeks, and flexible leave” (BIPR.com, 2010).
To remain competitive, organizations are now increasingly offering flexible working arrangements to a select group of employees either by direct recruitment or by retaining top-performing employees (BIPR.com, 2010). Employers can benefit by adopting workplace flexibility as an essential element in their human capital strategy, which can be a “powerful business tool and successful management practice” (FlexPaths, 2011, p.1).

Flexible work arrangements are now increasingly seen as a win-win situation both for the organization and also for the employee. The organization benefits by way of increased productivity and loyalty, and even direct cost savings in recruitment, and training resulting from employee turnover. On the other hand, the employees largely benefit from work-life balance (BIPR.com, 2010).
1.2 RESEARCH SIGNIFICANCE

Workplace flexibility has changed in developed countries because of the rise of knowledge work. “Knowledge work creates jobs that depend less on physical and more on mental ability”(Ellis & Stredwick, 2005, p.9), In other words, it is more reliant on mental work than physical work. It is predicted that the future workplace will be characterized by more creative and flexible work environments. In other words, a virtual office is expected to become more common. More emphasis will be put on performance and results rather than the number of hours worked; skills and competence will count more.

In the future, human resource management will be more decentralized (Venkatesh, 2009). “Flexible human capital practices, when adopted as a whole in a congruent cultural context, contribute to a workforce that is more skilled, stable, enthusiastic and free of distractions” (FlexPaths, 2011). Therefore, “as flexible working arrangements become part of the mainstream approach to work and the range of available options increases, there is an ever-pressing need to examine how such working practices affect the organization with regard to the performance of individuals and the impact on colleagues and managers” (Clare Kelliher; Cranfield School of Management, 2008, p.4). ...Download file to see next pages Read More